Dialectal Variation in Question Intonation: the Case of Swabian and Upper Saxon German

It is generally assumed that a question intonationally is accompanied with a certain question tune, usually characterized by a final rise in pitch (e.g. Bolinger 1978). If we consider German question intonation, the tonal characteristics of yes-no-questions seem to match the general pattern of a final rise in pitch. According to the intonational accounts of Standard German yes-no-questions ending low in pitch have not been proved (e.g. von Essen 1964, Féry 1993, Grice & Baumann 2000). Although carried out in different frameworks, the studies of von Essen (1964) and of Féry (1993) seem to agree on the basic intonational properties of question intonation in Standard German. Yesno-questions are characterized by a final rise in pitch, and the accent pattern can either be falling (1a and 2a) or rising (1b and 2b). In the notation of the autosegmental metrical model of intonation (Pierrehumbert 1980, Ladd 1996) on which the present study is based, too, the final rise is expressed by a high boundary tone as in (1) and (2).